While questions swirl around the future of TikTok, the platform continues to push ahead with its business offerings, this time via a new, interactive brand promotion option called ‘Gamified Branded Effects‘.
As noted in the post, Gamified Branded Effects enable brands to build branded games into their TikTok clips, with more than 20 templates available, which can be customized with various brand elements.
The option will be made available within TikTok’s self-serve ad platform, which it opened up to all businesses earlier this month.
It could be a simple way to build more engaging TikTok experiences – though you would also suspect that there would be some creative limits to such. If a lot of brands end up using certain templates, for example, the process could start to feel stale pretty quickly – but through specific audience targeting and customization, there, ideally, won’t be significant crossover with similar campaigns.
In some ways, the option is similar to Snapchat’s ‘Lens Web Builder‘ option, which enables brands to build AR Lens campaigns, based on templates.
The main difference here is that Lens Web Builder offers “hundreds of 3D objects, animations, and effects”, so there’s a lot more variety, reducing potential replication. But TikTok’s Gamified Effects could still have significant potential, especially for brands looking to reach younger audiences through the app.
But then, again, many brands will likely hesitate at making too much investment into TikTok at this stage.
With US authorities considering a ban on the app, and various other regions also raising concerns about its potential links to the Chinese Government, TikTok may be caught in the firing line, and could be cut off in many nations as a result.
This week, The Information has reported that US investors in ByteDance, the parent company of TikTok, have discussed the possibility of buying a majority stake in TikTok, in order to separate the app from its Chinese links. It seems unlikely that ByteDance would be interested in such a split – but then again, with more nations raising more concerns about potential Chinese interference, it may have little choice if it wants to keep TikTok running.
Indeed, as the UK enters a new stand-off with China over its 5G infrastructure – and its decision to exclude Chinese-owned Huawei from the project – France has also moved to phase Huawei out of its mobile networks due to rising concerns.
In this respect, TikTok’s future is largely out of its own hands, and that, as noted, may prompt more businesses to reconsider investing in the app, and sharing their information with the company.
But then again, TikTok offers reach to younger audiences, and many businesses will be looking to advertise on the platform regardless of the overriding debate.
If that’s you, then it may be worth looking into this latest interactive option.
